Senthil Kumaran, G.YOGITHA, S. H.2017-06-212017-06-212010-07-15Th-9830http://krishikosh.egranth.ac.in/handle/1/5810022382Manual processing of pomegranates consists of cutting the fruit by knife into pieces and then separation of arils by hand tends to be highly labour intensive, time consuming and unhygienic. The present investigation was undertaken to develop pomegranate aril remover. The physical and engineering properties of pomegranate fruit and aril were determined for design of various parts of aril remover. The hand operated and power operated operated pomegranate aril remover were designed, tested and were found suitable for aril removal. The hand operated pomegranate aril remover consisted of a operating handle, spring loaded reciprocating arms, semi circular solid hitting discs or heads, movable fruit holding platform, aril collecting chutes, aril collecting tray and frame. The hand operated pomegranate aril remover was modified into power operated pomegranate aril remover by using a power operated reciprocating mechanism. The arrangement was made for the semi circular solid hitting head to move in reciprocating motion to hit the inverted halved fruit and remove the arils. The hand operated pomegranate aril remover was evaluated at hitting height (0 to 2 cm) and power operated pomegranate aril remover was evaluated at hitting height (0 to 2 cm) and speed (72 to 120 strokes/min). Both hand operated and power operated pomegranate aril remover were compared with manual aril removal method. At the hitting height (2 cm) the hand operated pomegranate aril remover has throughput capacity of 14 kg/h, higher efficiency (95.46%) with lower aril loss (1.57%). Power operated pomegranate aril remover has throughput capacity of 19.67 kg/h, higher efficiency (93.17%) with lower aril loss (2.06%) at the hitting height (2 cm) and speed (72 strokes/min). Power operated pomegranate aril remover performed better than hand operated pomegranate aril remover and manual removal of arils. The arils removed by different methods performed better for all the tested sensory attributes like colour, flavor, crispness, taste and overall acceptability. The cost of aril removal was lower in case of power operated pomegranate aril remover (Rs. 0.66/kg) compared to hand operated pomegranate aril remover (Rs. 0.74/kg) and manual removal of arils (Rs. 2.36/kg).ennullThesis